Thursday, July 29, 2010

On my last post I had 27 comments! You guys are awesome. I love reading all of the comments, so thank you so much!

So a few months ago I was reading some blogs one day (as usual!) and I saw that someone had just purchased a necklace from Falling Whistles, and I thought it looked really interesting and I checked out the website to read more about it. I ended up buying myself this necklace.

100% of proceeds are used to rehabilitate war-affected children in Congo and advocate for their freedom. Check out their website for more information about it. Maybe buy one while you're at it? They're really nice necklaces and for such a great cause, plus everyone always asks about it while I'm wearing it, so you can get more people to check it out that way!

Another thing I had been seeing all over were these shoes, which I'm sure most of you have seen by now, called Toms. I saw some in Aritzia and tried them on, although they were a size too small, and they felt SO comfortable, so I knew I had to buy a pair. I checked out their website and I learned that for every pair that someone buys, they donate a pair to a kid in need, which is awesome. It made my decision to buy some that much easier. I grabbed this pair:

They're such comfortable shoes! I want to buy so many more pairs from them.

So after finding these two stores online and seeing how they donate to two different charities in their own ways got me thinking. I want to donate in some way once I open up my Etsy store. I thought about it for a while and looked up a bunch of different knitting charities, and I came across two that I really liked. The first one is Knit-a-Square. It's a charity that makes blankets for children affected by AIDS in southern Africa. They ask people to make and send in 8x8 inch knit or crocheted squares and they put together blankets out of them. So, that's what I've been working on lately. Knitting up squares to send over. I'm planning on donating at least one square for every sale that I make in my Etsy store. I'll send along a letter with the item that the person bought saying that 1 or however many squares were donated in their honour. I'm working on my tenth square right now. It's so easy to just knit one up while you're watching a tv show or something. If you don't know how to knit (or crochet. I haven't made any crocheted squares yet, but I'm going to as soon as I find where I put my crochet hooks! Haha.) there are so many helpful videos and websites out there. If any of you need some links, just let me know and I'll send them to you!

The other day Keith and I went to Stoney Creek with a couple of friends to the drive in and saw Salt (the ending was so abrupt I thought!) and a bit of Funny People. We left around midnight because we were pretty tired (and cold! I had never been to the drive in before and I thought we were going to be sitting in Keith's truck, haha. But we sat in lawn chairs with some blankets, but I didn't bring a sweater or anything. Next time!). Yesterday I went out with my mom and sister to the new cupcake store in town to get some cupcakes and some lunch and smoothies at Stir It Up!!!, then Keith and I watched the beginning of Season 6 or 7 of Entourage. Whatever season they're at now! Although I'm two seasons behind, haha. Today I went out for lunch with my mom to The Brown Dog, then we went to a sewing store to look for some left handed scissors (but the only ones we found were over 60$.. haha so to the States it is!). Tonight Keith and I are going over to De's to watch the season premiere of Jersey Shore! Hahaha Keith wants nothing to do with that. But oh well! (Hello Keith if you're reading this!) What are you guys up to tonight?

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

I decided I'm just going to use random facts for my titles of blog posts. It's better than "photos!" or something boring like that.

This morning I woke up and my left ankle was REALLY sore... I have no idea what I did to it. So no 30 Day Shred today. It's totally turning into the 60 Day Shred for me! Haha. Oh well. Today I'm going to watch some movies and knit some more squares. Maybe I'll write a post tonight (or tomorrow) about what the squares are for!

Monday, July 26, 2010

Yesterday I got to pick up a few new books from Chapters! I wish we had a Chapter's in town, but oh well. 15 minutes away isn't too bad. Anyways, here are the books I got:

I've been following this blog for a while, and it's hilarious! The book seems to be
pretty good. It's good for just picking up ever once in a while to read a few pages.

I bought this book a couple of year ago for my friend, and I always wanted a copy of it for myself. It's usually 23 or 24 bucks Canadian, but it was on sale for 9.99 yesterday, plus an additional 30% off so I picked a copy up for myself. It's hilarious.

This book looks like it's going to be hilarious, plus it was on sale for 4.99 plus an additional 30% off. I love the new sale section in Chapters!

What books have you guys been reading? Do you have any suggestions for the summertime? I'm going away this weekend and I might pick up a few more books... haha. I love reading so much.

Today I woke up and did the 30 Day Shred (ugh it's still so hard!) and then hung out in the pool for most of the day. Then I took Squirtle for a walk & Keith came over as soon as I stepped in the door, so we went for a little drive. He showed me this really weird "shoe" tree. He said when he first saw it about 4 years ago it only had a few pairs of shoes on it, now there are TONS. I should have taken a picture... it's not too far away though, so I'm sure we can drive by it again and I'll take some pictures.

I think we're just going to watch some movies, and I'm going to knit. I'm knitting a bunch of squares right now, I'll write more about that later this week! Hope you all have a good night!

Sunday, July 25, 2010

(I wrote this last night, but was having a hard time uploading anything.)
So I realized I haven't really put up many of my photos. Just random ones from online. I was finally able to upload some to this computer, so here are a few:

This is my puppy Squirt. (Well, she's 11. Not really a puppy, but she still looks like one.)

These are from Keith's birthday.Keith and I have been trying to grow something from an avocado pit for MONTHS.. and in the past few weeks it finally sprouted, and now it's SO tall. At least twice as tall as this is now. I have a book called Don't Throw It, Grow It! and I want to start growing more little plants and stuff.

Okay, for some reason blogger makes the pictures look REALLY weird... and flickr is being really slow for me, so I only have a few... I'll put more up later. Right now I have to go get ready to go to the race track (yay...) haha. My friend Tracy works there though so it won't be too bad! (Plus I'm bringing my knitting.) Earlier this week I went out with her looking for paint so she can antique a window for a picture frame (I love it when my friends do crafts, haha.) and I grabbed a TON of paint chips. I want to do something with them. I'm just not sure what yet. Any ideas?

Today I'm laying around the pool, then going to Costco with my Grandma (and Chapters!) and then playing frisbeeeeeee!

Thursday, July 22, 2010

(How do people come up with titles for their blog posts? I'm terrible at this... give me some suggestions please! Haha.)

Yesterday I made my famous pasta. (Uh, okay... I made pasta.) It's sooo good. And since I have no idea what to write about today (haha, sorry. I will make a schedule for the future!), I'll give you guys the recipe.

I don't really measure how much of everything that I put in. I just kinda see how it looks.

Start off with cherry tomatoes (or any kind of tomato. I just prefer cherry. They're so good & sweet.) and dice them. I leave some of them whole sometimes, because warm cherry tomatoes that pop in your mouth are SO good. So cut up the tomatoes, then throw them in a sauce pan and add olive oil and white wine vinegar. Or red wine vinegar. Whichever you prefer/have. I used red wine vinegar yesterday because I couldn't find the white wine and I was too hungry to look.

I loooooove garlic so I add a lot of garlic cloves. Our neighbours down the street grow garlic and gave us some bulbs and this is the best garlic I've ever had. The garlic cloves are HUGE and so strong. So I only used two, haha! That's probably a lot to everyone else, but I think garlic is one of my favourite foods (is garlic a food? Ah, who cares.). Then I put in a bunch of dried oregano. Oh and add sea salt and fresh ground pepper (or just plain old salt & pepper!).I keep in on the stove for a while and just have it on low-medium heat and stir every once in a while. Then put some water on the stove to boil it. I usually use orzo or angel hair pasta, but all I could find was the spiral kind. But, any kind of pasta works. (I mean, they all taste the same, don't they?) So once the water boiled I went out back and picked some fresh basil and oregano for the top. And grabbed some Parmesan cheese. Sometimes I add in some brie cheese just before the pasta is cooked, or ricotta, or other kinds that I can't think of right now... haha. And sometimes I add in a bit of cream to make it nice and creamy.

Once the pasta is cooked, drain it and then I pour a bit into the sauce pan with the sauce and mix, adding more as you go. Then I add some grated Parmesan and fresh basil and oregano on top and eat! (Preferably with garlic bread. I didn't take a photo of the garlic bread. Well, okay, I did. But it didn't turn out well. All of my cameras and computers seem to be going against me this summer!)

It's so good... Mmm. It's good cold the next day (or later that night) too. If you like cold pasta, that is... Sometimes I like to put a lot of grated mozzarella cheese in it, then put it into a baking dish and put more grated cheese on top. Then put it in the oven a bit to melt it and it's sooo gooooood... haha.

If you make this let me know how it turns out!

(You don't know how many times while I was writing this I forgot what words were... haha what is with me today! I was like, "Umm what's that thing that you put the tomaotoes in called again...." "What's that other thing called..." Hahaha.)

Monday, July 19, 2010

I just ate my first cherry tomato (okay, my first TWO) with a piece of basil from the garden. Now if I could only grow mozzarella cheese...

I'll put some pictures up soon, I just don't have any on my computer right now! (I'm not using my laptop because it's falling apart. I should take a picture of that too...)

Anyways, in a couple of weeks I'm going to Chicago for a few days. Does anyone have suggestions of what to do? I went for the first time a few years ago, and I haven't stopped craving more deep dish pizza since! So Gino's East is on the list, and Trader Joe's, because we don't have any in Canada (hopefully we will one day!), but does anyone have any suggestions of what I should do while I'm there? Where to go shopping and what to see and do?

Last night we had a fire and just had a hilarious night (I laughed soo much. I'm not sure if my stomach is sore from the 30 Day Shred or from laughing! I think it's a mixture of both... haha.) and I was so tired today (we didn't fall asleep until after 4am.) that I had TWO naps. And I never nap! So tonight I just caught up on some Breaking Bad (Ahhhh it's so good! I can't wait for season 4.) and did some knitting. Tomorrow we're going out for breakfast and then I think going to the movies with Tim & De (heeeey De!).